1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to photographic developing devices, and more particularly, to such a device that employs an easel support and an easel selectively locatable on the support in such a manner that a multiplicity of prints are capable of being produced from a single composition.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Heretofore, photographic developing devices have employed an easel with a multiplicity of covers arranged to selectively mask portions of a sheet of photographic paper. In such a device a negative, held by an associated enlarger, is composed on the top surface of the cover. Then the cover is opened and the photographic paper beneath the opened cover is exposed. Next, the easel is moved to a new position wherein another cover is generally within the beam of the enlarger bulb, the negative is composed, the enlarger is focused and the exposing process repeated. A disadvantage of such a device is that additional focusing and/or composing is necessary in order to obtain each print. As a consequence, relatively large amounts of time are required to print several prints on one sheet of paper. In addition, during the focusing and composing operations the enlarger is required to be turned "on". This, of course, decreases the lifetime of the relatively expensive enlarger bulbs.
In the patent art, several patents teach photographic developing devices. In particular, U.S. Pat. No. 3,944,364 entitled "Borderless Printing Easel" by Richard R. Petrini and Dorin F. Van Lue teaches a borderless printing easel including a paper support base and a set of mask plates removably positionable on the base which are hinged in such a manner as to enable each mask plate to be folded onto the top of an adjacent plate. This easel is capable of reproducing adjacent or nearly adjacent borderless prints on a single sheet of print paper.
Another printing easel comprising hinged doors which separately open and close to expose selected portions of a sheet of photographic paper is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,230,823 entitled "Easel for Printing a Plurality of Photographs" by Nicholas Krassopoulos.
In addition, U.S. Pat. No. 3,728,021 entitled "Multiple Print Easel" by Rudolph Retzyl and Martin D. Blanc disposes a print easel having various sized openings formed in a cover portion of a frame. A paper holder is slideably mounted to the base of the frame and is movable to enable a portion of the photographic paper held on the holder to be positioned beneath a selected cover. Such an easel produces prints which are spaced apart and typically requires the paper holder to be removed and turned 180.degree. to print on the upper portion of the sheet. However, none of the devices teach an apparatus in which an easel support is capable of engaging an easel having a plurality of covers, so as to guide the easel to selected locations on the support in such a manner that each cover is locatable in a predetermined location and as to enable a plurality of prints to be produced on a piece of photographic paper with a single focus of an associated enlarger.